The 15 Best Supernatural Episodes, Ranked – TVLine

A staple on The CW for 15 seasons, “Supernatural” can stand among the longest-running shows on American TV. The series follows brothers Sam (Jared Padalecki) and Dean Winchester (Jensen Ackles) as they hunt demons and other paranormal monsters preying on humanity. Cruising cross-country in their 1967 Chevy Impala, the brothers face everything from smaller-scale threats to enemies poised to trigger the apocalypse. But for all the raw emotion and divine stakes, the series always had a self-aware sense of humor about it, occasionally veering into overt breaking of the fourth wall.

Interestingly, the series began life as an admitted rip of “Kolchak: The Night Stalker” before forming its own enduring legacy. And what a legacy the show has taken on, running for over 300 episodes, inspiring millions of fans worldwide, even a couple spin-offs, including an anime series. But the original series still reigns supreme, with plenty of episodes that have become particularly revered by the show’s fan base. These are the 15 best “Supernatural” episodes ranked, chronicling the Winchester brothers’ greatest adventures over the course of the series.

One of the longstanding mysteries for a significant portion of “Supernatural” is the identity of the seemingly unassuming Chuck Shurley (Rob Benedict). Initially introduced as a writer and prophet, it becomes clear that Chuck is something more after his debut in the fourth season. The season 10 episode “Fan Fiction” has fun with this plot thread, as Sam and Dean stumble across a high school musical based on Chuck’s books about their lives. During the play’s performance, the brothers confront the goddess orchestrating the production for her own fiendish ends.

“Fan Fiction” isn’t the first “Supernatural” episode to provide metatextual fun while celebrating the show’s fan base but it is one of the most memorable. Seeing Sam and Dean run around with teenage pastiches of themselves and the many familiar figures from the supporting cast provides a lot of fun. That the play is a musical just adds to the unabashed glee of the proceedings right down to its explosive showstopper. In lesser hands, “Fan Fiction” could’ve come off grating and self-indulgent, but the episode pulls off its goofy concept well.

Another Chuck-centric episode is the 11th season episode “Don’t Call Me Shurley,” which finally confirms his identity after several seasons of speculation. Chuck summons Metatron (Curtis Armstrong), revealing himself to be God, requesting help to finish his autobiography, including his time living among humans. Metatron is shocked and disappointed at how uninvolved and disillusioned Chuck has become rather than intervening to help humanity against overwhelming threats. Meanwhile, Sam and Dean find a town affected by an insanity virus that spreads through an ominous fog.

“Don’t Call Me Shurley” stands among the most game-changing episodes of “Supernatural,” finally confirming the identity of its supreme -– and supremely conflicted –- deity. The reveal of Chuck as God was something that had been long-suspected and the episode gets this confirmation out of the way rather quickly. But the real highlight is the prolonged conversation between God and Metatron, providing fascinating insight on the wayward creator and his state of mind. A conversation-heavy episode that feels especially vital while setting up the show’s final major conflict, “Don’t Call Me Shurley” is a tremendous step forward.

While both he and Jared Padalecki got to visibly have fun with their characters, it was always special whenever Jensen Ackles got to really cut loose in playing Dean. This is certainly true of the fourth season episode “Yellow Fever,” which sees Dean infected by the lethal ghost sickness. The illness causes those afflicted to develop a deep-seated anxiety that grows into an overwhelming fear that essentially scares them to death. With his time running out, Dean has to find a way to fatally scare the ghost behind his ailment before he perishes.

Seeing Ackles play a progressively more frightened Dean is the underlying glue that holds “Yellow Fever” together. The story also provides a particularly inventive way to defeat a ghost organic to this tale’s premise. Finally, in an outtake included after the main story’s conclusion, the episode does end with Ackles lip-syncing to “Eye of the Tiger,” one of show’s best music moments. An all-around fun episode that gives Ackles interesting directions to take his character, “Yellow Fever” is a solid standalone story.

Season 2 started things off with a bang, picking up from Season 1 finale’s cliffhanger ending that saw the Winchesters caught in a devastating car accident. Season 2’s premiere, “In My Time of Dying,” reveals that Dean has become comatose from the wreck, refusing to give up his soul to a reaper, Tessa (Lindsey McKeon). To save his son, John Winchester (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) makes a deal with Azazel (Fredric Lehne), the demon who orchestrated the accident. This entails John making a huge sacrifice that sets the stage for his sons’ big conflict with Azazel unfolding over the remainder of the season.

So much of the first season of “Supernatural” is about Sam and Dean searching for their long-lost father while hunting monsters along the way. Just as the family is reunited, it’s cruelly separated by Azazel once again, and “In My Time of Dying” really captures that heartbreak. The episode is elevated by the rapport between Padalecki, Ackles, and Morgan, while setting up Dean’s journey towards the end of the season. An emotional setup for the second season and great showcase for Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s performance as John Winchester, “In My Time of Dying” makes the fight against Azazel especially personal.

Another story that lets Jensen Ackles take his character far outside of his comfort zone is Season 12’s “Regarding Dean.” While pursuing a witch in Arkansas, the elder Winchester brother is hit by a strange spell that leaves him with severe memory loss. With his sibling’s condition steadily worsening, Sam summons the friendly witch Rowena MacLeod (Ruth Connell) to help. The group must recover the spellbook used by the magical family that cursed Dean to cure him before it’s too late.

Ackles takes his usual role into some very interesting areas with “Regarding Dean,” veering from the comedic to the quietly heartbreaking. Amnesia might often feel like an overdone storytelling device but it’s handled well here rather than feeling like a well-worn gimmick. A lot of that quality comes down to both Ackles’ performance and his consistently strong rapport with Connell. The best episode from Season 12, “Regarding Dean” demonstrates the tonal balance that “Supernatural” mastered during its run.

Given the hellish and heavenly conflict they often found themselves in, Sam and Dean were certainly no stranger to dying themselves. Season 5’s “Dark Side of the Moon” opens with both brothers being murdered while in the midst of contending with the prophesied apocalypse. Taken to Heaven, the Winchesters find themselves at the mercy of the angels, some of whom are frustrated by the trouble they’ve caused on Earth. This culminates in the brothers learning that God is not willing to help them in averting the apocalypse before they’re resurrected.

As far as Sam and Dean’s deaths on “Supernatural,” “Dark Side of the Moon” wasn’t the first time for either of them nor would it be the last. This time around, their shared demise sets them up for a heavenly detour as the apocalypse edges ever forward. In doing so, the episode establishes that Heaven isn’t as noble as it appears to be, including its reigning deity. A harrowing experience for the Winchesters and Castiel as their faith is deflated, “Dark Side of the Moon” is a memorably emotional chapter in the series.

“Supernatural” provides its own take on the classic comedy movie “Groundhog Day” in Season 3’s “Mystery Spot.” While investigating a tourist spot in Florida, Sam finds himself reliving the same Tuesday over and over again, always punctuated by Dean being brutally killed. Sam tries to force the Trickster (Richard Speight Jr.) to break the cycle even as the wayward archangel tries to teach the trapped Winchester a lesson. This forces Sam to face the impending reality of a life without Dean even beyond the temporal loop.

In terms of the Winchester brothers dying, there is no single episode that has one of them die more than “Mystery Spot.” Dean is described as having died at least 100 times as Sam endures a recurring case of the Tuesdays all while stubbornly opposing what the Trickster is communicating to him. With so much of Season 3’s narrative involving the Winchesters trying to avert Dean’s promised death, the episode is a somber reminder of the stakes couched in a lighter story.

The second season ended with Dean trading his soul to save Sam’s life and that deal became due in the third season finale “No Rest for the Wicked.” Collection of Dean’s soul has fallen to the new demon leader Lilith (Sierra McCormick), with the Winchesters moving to intercept her and avert the hellish deal from coming to fruition. Tracking down Lilith to a small town in Indiana, the brothers and their allies take refuge when they enter an ambush. Barricading themselves in a home where Lilith had been tormenting a family, Sam and Dean learn that there is no escaping fate.

“Supernatural” was always good at fulfilling longstanding narrative promises and Dean’s grim destiny provided much of Season 3’s stakes. “No Rest for the Wicked” has a steadily mounting sense of dread and inevitability to it, fueled by Dean’s visions of the hellhound that will eventually kill him. This is juxtaposed by Sam refusing to surrender, despite the situation growing increasingly dire during the showdown with Lilith. Both a clear parallel to the second season finale and the payoff of season 3’s underlying story, “No Rest for the Wicked” sticks the landing.

The wackiest “Supernatural” story is the Season 13 episode “Scoobynatural,” which has Sam and Dean meet the literal Scooby gang. After solving a separate case, the brothers and Castiel are sucked into a haunted television set. This places them on a surprise animated team-up with Scooby (Frank Welker) and his friends only to find that a murderous ghost is interrupting the story. Working with the beloved animated characters, the displaced brothers must learn the truth about what’s haunting the television and find a way back to their world.

“Scoobynatural” is one of the weirdest TV crossovers, to be sure, but somehow it organically fits with both show’s vastly different sensibilities. Sam and Dean bring their usual self-aware sense of humor to the proceedings, with the episode poking fun at the usual Scooby-Doo formula. At the same time, the story presents the whole gang with a genuine mystery to be solved with life-and-death stakes. A fun reinvention of what “Supernatural” can be, “Scoobynatural” is one of the best episodes in the series’ later seasons.

The two-part second season finale, “All Hell Breaks Loose” revolves around a climactic confrontation against the demon Azazel. Searching for someone to lead his hellish armies, Azazel abducts those he fed his blood to when they were babies, including Sam, intending for them to fight to the death. This culminates in Sam getting stabbed to death by fellow kidnap victim Jake Talley (Aldis Hodge) just as Dean arrives to rescue his brother. While Dean faces a similar sacrifice his father made in the season 2 premiere, the Winchesters move to stop Azazel’s demonic invasion of Earth.

It may seem like cheating, but both parts of “All Hell Breaks Loose” really work in concert with one another and deserve a spot together. From the first half ending with Sam’s death to the increasingly desperate stakes in the second, this a two-parter that grabs the audience’s full attention. The episode provides a satisfying conclusion to a story that had been building since the series premiere while offering a clear path for the Winchesters moving forward. Answering a lot of the questions that had been brewing since the start while literally unleashing Hell on Earth, “All Hell Breaks Loose” lives up to its title.

Another episode that has fun with “Supernatural” and the wider television medium, the fifth season episode “Changing Channels” presents the brothers with a unique gauntlet. While investigating a murder apparently killed by Marvel’s Hulk, the brothers are forced to survive being placed in several different television shows. The duo quickly deduce that this is the work of the Trickster and begin to learn about his true nature as they endure television-inspired challenges. This revelation ties into the brothers’ intended role of preventing the apocalypse as they finally become free of the Trickster’s twisted games.

“Supernatural” had steadily been maneuvering itself towards a biblical apocalypse storyline since the debut of angels in the fourth season. “Changing Channels” continues that setup while confirming that Richard Speight Jr.’s Trickster was an archangel all along, albeit in hiding. Despite these divine overtones, the episode itself has plenty of fun along the way, riffing on everything from “Knight Rider” to Japanese game shows. “Changing Channels” is a fun reminder that “Supernatural” was just as effective in handling lighter stories without compromising its stakes.

The most meta that “Supernatural” ever got was in the sixth season episode “The French Mistake,” completely obliterating the fourth wall. The story has Sam and Dean sent to an alternate reality where they become actors Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles, respectively. The two are in Vancouver working on a television series called “Supernatural,” complete with the rest of the cast and crew from the show. As the two search for a way to return to their home reality, they are pursued by the angelic hitman Virgil (Carlos Sanz).

“The French Mistake” takes the show’s constant sense of self-awareness and turns it upon the series itself. This is very much an episode that feels like a good-natured wink to the fans, specifically those acutely aware of the show’s behind-the-scenes details. The actors are clearly having fun with the episode’s premise and that enjoyment spreads to the audience. The type of story that a show can only get away with once, “The French Mistake” is the best episode in Season 6 by a longshot.

After seemingly being condemned to Hell in the third season finale, Dean is mysteriously resurrected in the fourth season premiere “Lazarus Rising.” Reuniting with Sam and their mutual friend Bobby Singer (Jim Beaver), Dean investigates who saved him from eternal damnation. An attempt by psychic Pamela Barnes (Traci Dinwiddie) horrifically backfires but reveals that the individual responsible is named Castiel (Misha Collins). This revelation has the brothers summon the enigmatic figure themselves, placing them on a divine mission.

Misha Collins’ Castiel gets his iconic entrance in “Lazarus Rising,” quickly becoming a fixture for the remainder of the series. While Dean’s return was something of an inevitability, the fourth season premiere makes a mystery of it, subverting expectations. This subversion carries over to the reveal of Castiel’s true angelic nature, initially setting him up as a menacing figure connected to heaven and not hell. An exciting start to the fourth season and introduction of one of the series’ greatest characters, “Lazarus Rising” is the show’s best season premiere.

Series creator Eric Kripke made a 1967 Chevy Impala the Winchester’s baby, a classic car that they grew attached to more than some of the show’s supporting characters. The car itself serves as the point-of-view character for the 11th season episode “Baby,” keeping the action centered around the automobile. 

The Winchesters investigate a gory monster attack at a small town in Oregon, debating the impact of their monster-hunting role on their personal lives. Arriving at their destination, the brothers need to learn not only what exactly they’re up against but who in town is hiding the monstrous secret.

“Baby” is a character piece, largely featuring a typical day in the life of the Winchesters from the perspective of their beloved car. The story’s monster-of-the-week plays out like a murder mystery, with the real appeal being the interplay and insight between the brothers. This is elevated by the car-centric cinematography underscoring that the Impala truly is part of the family. A strong reminder that not every great episode needs to have big twists and world-threatening stakes, “Baby” is a celebration of the show’s core dynamic.

The apocalypse is something that had been brewing for years across the first five seasons of “Supernatural.” This finally comes to a head in the fifth season finale “Swan Song” as Lucifer (Mark Pellegrino) prepares to take control of Sam’s body. Dean and his allies try to save Sam and prevent Lucifer from carrying out Armageddon in the ultimate showdown. This is all juxtaposed with Chuck narrating the story and sharing the origins of the Impala while revisiting the series’ history.

While there are plenty of great episodes and creative directions afterwards, “Swan Song” feels like the natural conclusion to the original “Supernatural” saga. The episode provides the culmination of the apocalypse storyline, Sam’s demonic heritage, and the suggestion that Chuck is more than just a prophet as initially suspected. More than those narrative developments, the story is a reaffirmation of the brotherly bond between Sam and Dean, which is the true emotional core of the series all along. At once an epic climax and the perfect distillation of what the show is all about, “Swan Song” stands as the best episode of “Supernatural.”